Resilient NOLA News

NEW ORLEANS – Today, Mayor Mitch Landrieu was joined by Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards and City, State and Federal officials to celebrate the City of New Orleans award of $141.3 million from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD)’s National Disaster Resilience Competition (NDRC) . HUD’s competition is designed to help state and local communities recover from past disasters while improving their ability to withstand future extreme events through strategic community investments.

New Orleans is one of only 13 jurisdictions out of 67 eligible applicants to be awarded funding from NDRC and the award is the second largest nationally.

Mayor Landrieu, joined by The Rockefeller Foundation President Judith Rodin, 100 Resilient Cities (100RC) President Michael Berkowitz, New Orleans Chief Resilience Officer Jeff Hebert, Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Administrator Craig Fugate, and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administrator (NOAA) Dr. Kathryn Sullivan, unveiled Resilient New Orleans – a concrete, strategic roadmap for the City of New Orleans to build urban resilience. The strategy, a joint effort between the City and 100RC – Pioneered by The Rockefeller Foundation, proposes 41 actions to build citywide resilience. The strategy will help New Orleans become a more equitable, adaptable and prosperous place for all of its residents as the City approaches its tri-centennial in 2018.

For more information and to download the strategy, please visit resilientnola.org.

The Resilient NOLA Team has released a report as part of the Resilience Strategy development process that serves as the compilation and baseline evaluation of assets, shocks and stresses, stakeholder perceptions, current approaches, and emerging opportunities that were explored in Phase I. The information collected has informed the creation of Focus Areas, which will guide the more targeted discussion of approaches and implementation in Phase II of the strategy development process.

Learn more about the Preliminary Resilience Assessment here.

City of New Orleans Chief Resilience Officer Jeff Hebert presented a working definition of "City Resilience" and introduced the City's partnership with 100 Resilient Cities and the forthcoming Resilience Strategy on Saturday, April 18 at the Quarterly Neighborhood Leaders Roundtable meeting. 

Find the presentation here!

The City of New Orleans began its engagement with 100 Resilient Cities – pioneered by the Rockefeller Foundation – in 2014, and has since been involved in the development of a comprehensive resilience plan that will enable the city to better prepare for and withstand catastrophic events as well as chronic stresses.